The Wellington Chronicles, Part 1: Sacrifices
by Antonio Cabaas
Summary: Star Trek Star Wars crossover. The USS Constellation finds a gateway to a Galaxy far, far away...
1. Prologue

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THE WELLINGTON CHRONICLES

PROLOGUE

By Antonio Cabañas

Disclaimer: Star Trek in all its incarnations and all related characters are property of Paramount Pictures. Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry. Star Wars and all related characters are owned by George Lucas. I'm only borrowing them for fun. Ana Giovannotti, T'Lin, and the Zerlans have been created by me.

I wish to thank my beta-reader, Carycomic, for his help and support all this time.

E-mail: borg31de777yahoo.es.

Spoilers: Star Trek (the original series) "The Cage", "The Menagerie" and "The Doomsday Machine". Star Wars Episodes I, II, III, V and VI.

* * *

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Zerla system, G'orrin stellar cluster

U.S.S. Constellation, NCC-1017

Stardate 1404.7

Commander Ana Giovannotti, first officer of the USS Constellation, had just lost another chess game with her commanding officer. She had been playing a good game, she knew but some stupid error that she still couldn't see had given the victory to Commodore Decker.

Commander, can I walk with you? – said lieutenant (j.g.) T'Lin, the communication officer of the Constellation.

T'Lin, we are friends and you can call me Ana, at least outside the bridge. -

Sorry, com… Ana . I only wanted to say that the Zerlan had just transmitted us their maps of the cluster. -

Very kind of them, considering how they received us. -

Their first contact with a Federation starship, three years ago, was quite… eventful. -

Indeed – answered Ana, who thought "A polite way of saying that was a royal mess. Captain Pike was lucky enough to get out without losing anyone." Then she remembered something. – T'Lin, you have been watching our chess game, what did I do wrong? -

You could have checkmated in the 47th movement if you had sacrificed your queen in the 45th. That's an error that you do frequently in chess, not to sacrifice pieces when you must. -

Exactly. – said Matthew Decker behind them. – Ana, sometimes we must do sacrifices. And I'm not speaking only of chess. Now that you are going to become the commander of the USS Wellington, you should bear in mind, that sometimes, you must put the life of the crew in jeopardy, even send them on a suicide mission if the stakes are high enough. -

**STAR TREK / STAR WARS:**

**THE WELLINGTON CHRONICLES**

**PROLOGUE**

Captain's log

Stardate 1407.4

The Zerlan premier has decided to host a goodbye dinner for us. I suppose that this is her way of apologizing for the way how we were received by the Zerlan Space Navy. This unexpected party is going to delay our departure by a few hours.

The celebration was finally over, and most of the senior officers were glad of that. The Zerlan tended to be long-winded and Zerlan politics carried that trait to extremes.

Commodore Decker walked toward the Zerlan premier to bid her farewell. The premier was a slender woman in her fifties, with the characteristic tawny hair and twin dark spots on both sides of the forehead of the Zerlan species. She was talking with two other Zerlans, obviously high-ranking officials of her government whe she saw Decker approaching and went to salute him with a charming smile.

Commodore Decker, I hope that this will be the beginning of a time of friendship between our peoples. -

I hope that also, premier Glynn. Another ship should arrive in a few weeks with diplomats to fine-tune the terms of the treaty. -

We'll be waiting for them. -

I should warn you that Federation diplomats have a reputation of being between the most obnoxious creatures in the Universe. – said Decker smiling.

I'm used to that, after all, here, in the cluster, we have thirteen starfaring civilizations sharing less than one hundred cubic light-years, so I think that I will manage. – answered the premier – What will be the next system that you will visit, by the way? -

I think that the name, in your starcharts, is Alyndick.Why do you ask? -

Oh, when I was younger I worked as a scientist in one of the few survey ships of our Space Navy. Probably a good portion of the info on our starcharts was collected by that ship. – answered the premier – Alyndick, you have said? A pretty boring system, from what I recall. But I thought that the previous Federation starship that was in the cluster, how it was called, by the way, had already been there. -

It was the USS Enterprise, premier. And I suppose that I'll have to check it. – said Decker.

"Odd" he thought. From what he remembered of Chris Pike's log, the next stop after Zerla was Starbase 27, to repair battle damage. Now that he thought about it, the Zerlan Space Navy ships hadn't strike him as powerful enough to inflict such damage to a Constitution-class starship. From the corner of his eye he saw the other crewmembers of the Constellation coming to where they were. It was time to get back to the ship.

Premier, I want to thank you for you hospitality toward me and my crew. -

The premier smiled, although with a bit of embarrassment.

It was the least that we could do after how we received you. The old regime records misled us totally about your intentions. – said the premier. – I hope that we will meet again. -

I hope so, too. – said Decker, while the other officers gathered around him. He signaled the premier who nodded and took two steps back, a bit too far, maybe, but the Zerlans had bad experiences with that kind of technology, although they were still experimenting with it. Decker produced a communicator from his belt and said. – Decker to Constellation, six to beam up. -

Soon after, they disappeared in a whirl of yellow sparks.

****

U.S.S. Constellation

On route to Alyndick system.

Captain's personal log.

Supplementeal

I have checked thoroughly Pike's log about the mission. I should have known that there was something odd about this when we first faced the Zerlan Space Navy. As I remembered, there was no record of visiting the Alyndick system, or of ever taking that route, but there were a few missing days when a visit to that system could have taken place.

I have sent a fomal petition to Starfleet Command about those logs, but one thing is clear. The missing logs contained something that had to be erased from the Enterprise'd database. And then, classified. I only have heard of one event where that measure was taken, the Enterprise visit to Talos IV, that resulted in the establishing of the only death penalty in the Federation's legal code. If this is the case, why haven't we been warned to stay away that system? I'm having a bad feeling about this…

TO BE CONTINUED…


	2. Chapter 1

Sacrifices (2nd Part)

By Antonio Cabañas

Disclaimer: Star Trek in all its incarnations and all related characters are

property of Paramount Pictures. Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry. Star Wars and all related characters are owned by George Lucas. I'm only borrowing them for fun.

E-mail: borg31de777yahoo.es.

Spoilers: Star Trek (the original series)" The Cage"," The Menagerie" and" The Doomsday Machine". Star Wars Episodes I, II, III, V and VI.

_U.S.S. Constellation, NCC-1017_

_On route to the Alyndick system._

Lieutenant (j.g.) Carlos Tarasca recorded the message that he had received from his" old friend" Arne Davin in a data cartridge, and after securing the door of the cabin that he shared with three other crewmembers, he took a sports bag from under the bed.

He didn't open the bag, instead he turned it around and opened a hidden zipper in the botton. From there, he produced an alien-looking device, with a port to insert a Federation data cartridge.

After inserting it, he pressed a few buttons and a text message scrolled on the small screen of the device.

"Damn!", he thought. His mission had been cancelled, and he was ordered to return to the Klingon Empire as soon as possible.

Korlath, A.K.A. Carlos Tarasca, wasn't stupid. He was aware that his House had fallen out of favor in the last power shift in the Klingon High Council, but he thought that being part of the elite selected to receive the necessary alterations to pass as a Terran, and in his case, infiltrate Starfleet, would protect him. Obviously, he was wrong.

No, there had to be more. He pressed another series of buttons, using another code that was reserved only to their elite force, and he found another message there. What he read there was far worse than anything that he could have been expecting.

His House had been exterminated. All of them. His father, his mother, his brothers and sisters, nephews and nieces… and Mirza, his mate. He followed the old traditions, almost abandoned in this day, and howled for their deaths.

After that, he started to think. It was obvious what Davin thought that he should do, ritual suicide, not that he had many options to start with. Even if he didn't choose to return, his death was almost sure. The Klingon Empire had a very long arm. What could he do?.

First things first. He took the data cartridge and smashed it.

_Captain's log _

_Stardate 1409.8_

_After our visit to Zerla, we are going to proceed to survey the Alyndick system. If the data that figures in the Zerlan starcharts is accurate, we shouldn't have any problems._

Commodore Matthew Decker, commanding officer of the USS Constellation, signed the log and handed it to the yeoman. He hadn't consigned to the log his suspicions regarding the previous Starfleet mission into the cluster. He hadn't even shared them with his first officer, Commander Ana Giovannotti, who was standing to his side.

He looked around, seeing the bridge bustling with activity. Well, he thought, with this crew I could face the devil itself.

"Mr. Masada, what do the Zerlan starcharts say about the Alyndick system?" The hispanic-japanese officer called the info from the Constellation database and started to read.

"Alyndick: one-star planetary system, G0 star, 7 planets, two of them M-class. No intelligent lifeforms." he paused for a moment, as he looked through the visor in his station "This is odd, sir."

"Well, we are Starfleet Officers, weird is our business." said Decker with a chuckle, although he was fearing that they were going to discover what had been so badly damaged the Enterprise 3 years ago "What is so odd, Guillermo?."

"From this distance I should be able to detect at least the planetary giants of the system."

"Of course, and…?" said Decker, his face serious, inside him a growing feeling of dread.

"But I can't."

Decker didn't say anything at first, leaving his crew to cope with the news. When he judged that the revelations had been assimilated, he asked:

"Are there any other anomalies in the system, Mr. Masada?"

"The star has a higher concentration of heavy elements than what could be expected from a star of its size and age. And it's unusually active in the theta band."

"And let me guess, there was nothing about that in the Zerlan starcharts."

"Exactly, sir."

After a few minutes of silence, Decker started to issue orders to the bridge crew.

"Ensign T'Lin, you are going to send our discovery to Starfleet Command. Mr. Masada, I want a full sensor sweep of the system, and Mr. Tarasca…" he said turning to the helmsman. "Keep course and accelerate to warp 6."

Three versions of "Aye, sir" followed Decker order. Any observer could have said that the behavior of the bridge officers changed after the discovery. The usual chatter and banter between the officers had been replaced by a tense silence, and even the Vulcan communications officer was sitting more still than ever on her seat.

"ETA to Alyndick system, Mr. Neveth?" asked commander Giovannotti to the Andorian navigator.

"Thirty minutes, commander."

"Any answer from Starfleet, Lieutenant?" asked Decker to T'Lin.

"No, sir. But…"

"But…?"

"I'm not sure, sir, but I think that I heard Admiral Skellos in the background when Starfleet Command acknowledged my message."

Skellos... this was getting more mysterious for moments. Skellos career had been officially an unremarkable one, but Decker knew that he had gained his stripes doing covert operations for Starfleet Intelligence. And he suspected that he was the current head of SFI.

"Commodore, Starfleet had issued a yellow alert to all the ships in this sector and the adjacent ones." said T'Lin, and stopped by the moment while she listened to a message through her earplug. "Commodore, incoming message from Starfleet Command to you. It needs a security code."

"I'll see it in my quarters." he said, rising from the captain chair "Commander Giovannotti, the bridge is yours."

After Decker had gone into the turbolift, and Anna had seated herself, she asked:

"Guillermo, what is your opinion about what happened to the system?"

Guillermo Masada squirmed a bit in his chair, clearly unsure of what to answer. There were several possibilities, but none of them seemed to fit into the scarce data that they had.

"I don't really know, Commander." he said, finally. "The best bet would have been a supermassive object, like a neutron star or a black hole passing through the system. The tidal forces would had destroyed the planets and reduced them to rubble. But that would have produced alterations in the star that would have been detectable since before we entered the Cluster. Another possibility would be a rogue gas giant planet, which would have disturbed the orbits and produced a chain reaction of collisions, but that process would have needed decades, and the last Zerlan survey was from eight years ago, when everything was normal."

_USS Constellation. Captain's quarters._

Decker refrained from uttering a curse when Admiral Zorba Skellos, an old man in his seventies, appeared on the screen of his desk computer terminal.

"Hello, Matt. I suppose that you are wondering about the anomalies of the system, and the reasons behind the yellow alert. I know that you have asked about Pike's missing logs. You are n the right track, and all the pertinent data is being sent to you in a coded data packet from Starbase 12. Skellos out."

_USS Constellation. Bridge_

"Whatever's happened, it's very probable that the conditions of the system will be chaotic when we arrive there. Pretty similar to a newborn star system, but less dense."

"Mr. Tarasca, are you up to the task?"

"Of course, commander."

For a moment Carlos Tarasca considered the possibility of crashing the ship, but he dismissed the notion almost immediately. In the weeks that he had spent aboard the ship, after replacing the real Carlos Tarasca, he had come to understand this people, and his honor demanded that if he was going to be their doom, they needed to know who had killed them.

TO BE CONTINUED…


	3. Chapter 2

**Sacrifices (3rd Part)**

_By Antonio Cabañas_

**Disclaimer:** Star Trek in all its incarnations and all related characters are property of Paramount Pictures. Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry. Star Wars and all related characters are owned by George Lucas. I'm only borrowing them for fun.

**E-mail:** borg31de777yahoo.es.

I want to thank my beta-reader, Carycomic for his help through all this time.

**Spoilers:** Star Trek (the original series) "The Cage", "The Menagerie" and "The Doomsday Machine". Star Wars Episodes I, II, III, V and VI

_USS Constellation._ _Conference room._

"As you know, thirty minutes ago I received a message from Admiral Skellos. That message was partly an answer to our findings. And partly a result of my queries regarding missing logs from the Enterprise. That was the reason why I ordered us to slow to Warp 4, so I would have time to study the coded data packet that we received just afterwards." said Decker at the head of the conference table "Under my responsibility, I'm going to share its contents with you."

Decker introduced the data disc inside the reader and activated the screen. On the screen appeared Christopher Pike, sitting in what must have been his quarters in the Enterprise. He seemed very healthy, very different from the shell of a man whom had he seen not too long ago. Next to him there, was a reptilian alien clad in a white and brown robe.

"Recent events had made it necessary to record this message. In our survey of the Alyndick system, we found that the planetary system had been destroyed by an unknown cause. One of the planets destroyed was a massive gas giant. Lieutenant Commander Spock, my science officer, theorizes that the explosion of said planet, which was, apparently three times the size of Jupiter, opened the time-space anomaly that brought his ship to our space when we were studying the anomaly while making repairs." he said, and signaled to the creature to his right. "His name is Sirk Luden. He is a refugee hiding from a totalitarian government in his home galaxy called the Galactic Empire…"

"I don't mean any disrespect for you, Captain Pike, but I think that I can explain this better than you." said Luden

Pike nodded and the alien started to explain:

"I was a Jedi Knight. An order of warrior monks that served as the peacekeeping force in the Galactic Republic, the predecessor of the Empire. As a result of our training, the Jedi Knights possessed some skills similar to what you call psionic powers. Around 25 years ago the Jedi Council, the ruling body of the order, started to perceive the rising of evil forces. But what they didn't know was that the evil forces had infiltrated the Republic. Those dark forces fostered conflicts, the Clone Wars, as a mean to gain power and create an Empire ruled by terror. When the Empire was proclaimed from the ruins of the Republic, one of our own, now known as himself Darth Vader, betrayed and hunted us. I had been hiding for almost thirteen years, but Vader found my hide-out and I was forced to flee. Several Imperial crafts were expecting me in orbit, and my ship was damaged, although I managed to jump into hyperspace. The hyperdrive failed in mid-course, stranding me in the middle of nowhere. After a few weeks I discovered a hyperspace distortion, and using the maneuvering thrusters I managed to put my ship inside. Captain Pike ship found me on the other side." he sat again, and Pike resumed speaking.

"A few hours after we recovered Mr. Luden's ship, another ship emerged from the anomaly and claimed Mr. Luden as a criminal and terrorist. When I suggested to let the Federation authorities judge it, the Imperial ship fired at us, but we managed to convince them to go back from where they came, if they didn't want to get trapped here." said Pike "From our own findings and what Mr. Luden has told us, this Galactic Empire is, except for FTL drive, fifty to a hundred years behind us in technology. But what makes them so dangerous is their sheer capacity of production. They have the resources of a Galaxy to draw upon, and the will to use them. The Alyndick Anomaly is closed now, but Lieutenant Spock, my science officer, thinks that under the right circumstance can be opened again. A sign of that opening will be an increased activity in the theta band of the Alyndick primary." he took a breath and continued "My recommendation to Starfleet Command is that if the Anomaly opens again we have to close it, by any means necessary."

_Captain's log_

_Stardate_ _1409.1_

_The information that Admiral Skellos sent us had revealed to be accurate. When we entered the system we detected a time-space breach of approximately 2 metersinf diameterat the same point where the Enterprise found the Anomaly 4 years ago. And it's growing at a steady rate. Fortunately the USS Wellington and the USS Excalibur will be here in one hour._

"Any change in the Anomaly, Mr. Masada?"

"None, sir. My calculations show that in 36 hours the Anomaly will be big enough to allow a ship of our size to pass through."

"Good." was Decker's only response. In thirty-six hours a fleet big enough to stop anything short of the entire Imperial Klingon Defense Force, including a dreadnought, one of Starfleet's few true warships, will be deployed in the system.

Commander Giovannotti came back from the engineering station, where she had been discussing some things with the Chief Engineer about the readiness of the ship for combat, and placed herself next to the command chair. Decker used the opportunity to ask something that he had wanted to ask her from the time that he heard of her new post.

"Ana, what how do you like your new post? To most people, becoming first officer of a Larson-class destroyer after being first officer of a Connie would be akin to a demotion."

"Yes, I know. But Sam... Commander Moskowitz is going to be promoted to captain in a few months and offered the command of a Ranger or a Constitution-class starship, and I will be in the best position to become the commanding officer of the Wellington."

"Very well, I see that you have thought about the subject. The truth is that in these 6 years with you under my command, first in the Yorktown and later here, I have seen how you have become an outstanding officer. In fact I think that you can become a better officer than me."

"Commodore, you are one of the best and brightest officers of Starfleet. I cannot aspire to reach your level."

"Ana, you..."

"Captain, I'm sorry to interrupt, but something small is crossing through the breach." said Masada.

"A probe?" asked Decker, as professional as ever.

"Maybe, sir."

"Yellow Alert, sir?" asked Ana to his side.

"Yes, Ana. Let's see what this Empire has to offer."

A violet vortex opened before the Constellation, from which exited three small crafts.

"One-man spacecrafts, highly maneuverable. I'd say that they are fighters." said Masada. Decker nodded, thinking about the tactical implications of this. Masada continued to offer the readings of the sensors. "Overpowered ion engines for a ship of that size, laser-based weapons of unknown nature and no signs of FTL capacities..."

"Can they receive in subspace?"

"I don't think so, sir. The fighters seem to be communicating in the EM bands exclusively."

"T'Lin, open a channel in their frequencies." When the impassive Vulcan woman nodded, Decker started to speak. "Unidentified crafts; this is Commodore Matthew Decker on board of United Star Ship Constellation. We mean you no harm. Please answer." There wasn't any answer, but one at a time the crafts went again into the breach and disappeared.

Decker looked to Anna, who shrugged.

"Sir, the growth of the breach is accelerating geometrically; the 36 hours that I estimated earlier has become ten minutes."

"Here is the answer." said Decker between his teeth, and then he shouted "Red Alert!" he turned to the communications officer "Ensign T'Lin, warn the Wellington and the Excalibur. It seems that we are going to need them sooner than we thought."

"They aren't going to be here on time, sir." remarked commander Giovannotti.

"I know, but it's the only thing that we can do."

The tension was growing on the bridge of the Constellation as the minutes slowly passed. The shields were up, and the weapons on stand-by, ready to be activated at a moment notice. The ten-minutes mark came and went.

"Thirteen minutes, sir." said Masada. "The energy that they must be spending on this is incredible, sir, enough to power the entire Earth power grid for two weeks."

Commander Giovannotti whistled, amazed. Decker merely nodded. As with a few others seasoned Starfleet captains he had found a few devices, generally left by some extinct civilization, that used incredible amounts of energy to work, so that hadn't caught him by surprise.

"Sir, a ship is passing through the breach."

"Ensign T'Lin, program the computer to send coded data packets to the Wellington and the Excalibur every thirty seconds detailing all the readings that Mr. Masada collects from the ship, and start to transmit messages of peace in linguacode and all known languages."

"Aye, sir."

The vortex opened and a ship started to slowly emerge. It was too soon to ascertain the appearance of the ship, engulfed in the blinding glow of the wormhole-like phenomena, but it seemed big.

"Sir, from the readings of the anomaly, I estimate that it's at least two times bigger than the Constellation and several times more massive."

TO BE CONTINUED...


	4. Chapter 3

**Sacrifices (4th Part)**

By Antonio Cabañas

**Disclaimer:** Star Trek in all its incarnations and all related characters are property of Paramount Pictures. Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry. Star Wars and all related characters are owned by George Lucas. I'm only borrowing them for fun.

**E-mail:** borg31de777yahoo.es.

**Answer to reviewers: _Legolas0:_** sorry, but as you can see they have found a Star Destroyer from Empire (it's not as I had given enough clues in chapter 3)

**Spoilers:** Star Trek (the original series) "The Cage", "The Menagerie" and "The Doomsday Machine". Star Wars Episodes I, II, III, V and VI

_USS Constellation, Bridge_

The vortex slowly opened, letting everybody see the wedge-shaped outline of the ship that was passing through it. It was big, more than double the size of the Constellation.

"Mr. Tarasca, energizing the phasers, load torpedoes and ready the shields." ordered Decker to the helmsman, and then opened a channel to engineering. "Lieutenant Zervis, I want all the power that you can provide us"

"I'll do my best, sir." said the andorian woman who held the deputy chief engineer post "It's a pity that Mr. Sablin is on leave, he is more experienced than me in combat situations."

"You'll do fine, lieutenant." said the commodore trying to encourage the young engineer.

"Thank you, sir. Zervis out" said lieutenant Zervis closing the intercom.

"My... God! Look at that... thing!" said ensign Neveth, the andorian navigator, at the same time that Decker heard Ana gasp.

Decker looked at the screen, seeing a big ship illuminated by the closing vortex. Wedge-shaped, with a tower-like superstructure in the aft end. Several big engines could be seen glowing behind the ship, and in the tower, almost directly in front of the Constellation, several large windows signaled the position of the bridge of the other vessel.

"Commodore, don't you think that energize the phasers could be considered an hostile action?" asked Anna.

"Probably, but except in the case of a technological breakthrough in the last 4 years, they have no way of detecting that." answered Decker. "T'Lin, hail..."

"Sir, they are signaling us, audio and video." interrupted the Vulcan communications officer.

"On screen."

The face of a blue-eyed bony man with a thin grey moustache appeared on the screen. The color of the uniform seemed to accentuate the cruelty of his looks. Next to him a man in a similar uniform looked nervously to the first one. 'Captain and First Officer' he guessed.

Behind the Imperial Captain, there were two pits in the ground where people clad in similar uniforms tended several antiquated-looking workstations. 'So they look at the captain with respect' thought Decker, having seen similar arrangements, although less pronounced, in Klingon vessels. His dislike for the Empire was growing in leaps and bounds.

"I'm captain Hengest of the Imperial Star Destroyer Enigma. Who are you, and what are your intentions?"

"I'm commodore Matthew Decker, commanding officer of the U.S.S. Constellation. We were performing a survey of this sector when we discovered that the anomaly had reopened." said Decker, not exactly lying, and not trying to conceal the fact that there had been a previous encounter. "On behalf of the United Federation of Planets I welcome you to this space. We want to establish pacific diplomatic relations with whatever government that you represent."

"I am pleased that we share that objective, commodore." said Hengest, with a smile that sent a chill through Decker spine "In order to reach that objective, you should abandon this system, that I claim in the name of the Galactic Empire, immediately. Your continued permanency would be considered an act of war."

Decker sighed. He had been fearing this outcome from the beginning.

"Can I ask the reason for that claim, captain? For all that I know we are very far from your territory."

"To have the security that your people don't invade us, of course." said Hengest, deadpan. "I have to protect the Empire."

"But that would provide you with a beachhead for an invasion of this space, captain. And I have to protect the Federation." and thought 'Specially from people like you.'

"Of course, Decker. Die well." and the image of Hengest disappeared from the screen.

Imperial Star Destroyer Enigma, bridge 

"Hengest to Flight Deck Commander. Deploy all our fighters!"

The First officer, that stood to Hengest side, bit his lips. He hadn't been all that convinced that the invasion plan was a good idea for the Empire. He, along with most of the officers in command positions in the fleet assembled around the Kahelin Vortex, had reviewed parts of the logs of the Battleaxe, the ship that had found the Vortex following a Jedi fugitive four years ago. The "Federation" starship energy levels were...

He shook his head, whether he agree with this course of action or not, he had to carry out his orders. It was his duty to the Empire.

USS Constellation, Bridge 

"Sir, they are launching fighters!"

"Shields up! Masada, what are their tactical capabilities? And how many fighters have they launched?"

"Forty high-energy laser banks, twenty particle beam cannons, and shields about as powerful as ours, although they seem to use old-style deflector screen technology." said Masada. "They have launched four wings of three fighters each.""

"So, with a few high frequency phaser shots, their shields will be down." said Ana, who had started as a engineer before switching to command.

"Yes, commander." then something caught his eye "Sir, the Enigma has powered her engines and has set an interception course."

"Their lasers must have a limited range."" commented Decker. "When will the fighters reach us?"

"Three... two... one... now!" said Masada. When he said 'now' the ship rocked slightly.

"Shields at ninety-five percent." announced 'Carlos Tarasca' from the helm.

"Tarasca, torpedo barrage on each fighter wing! And fire phasers onto the Enigma!."

On the screen they saw how the fighters exploded like firecrackers, and how the twin bluish beam shot from the ventral side of the saucer failed by mere inches. But three of the fighters had survived the barrage, although heavily damaged, without any hope of surviving the destruction of their crafts they rammed the Constellation.

"Shields down to 53!" said the ensign manning the engineering station on the bridge. "Phasers off-line!."

"Sir, the Enigma is firing at us!" said Masada from the science station.

"Brace yourselves!"

The ship rocked again, this time with much greater violence, and one of the stations exploded in a rain of sparks, the burnt circuits producing an acrid smoke.

"Shields at 12 and going down!" shouted somebody between the smoke,

"Tarasca, full torpedo barrage to the Enigma!" ordered Decker, who somehow had managed to stay in the command chair, then punched the intercom. "Zervis, I want the Phasers on-line as fast as you can."

Tarasca, who had fallen besides the helm, rose up and keyed the commands in his console. The reddish missiles impacted all over the Imperial ship, which now appeared as heavily damaged as the Constellation.

Both ships moved one around the other, keeping their distance like two boxers waiting for an opening in the other defense.

_Imperial Star Destroyer Enigma, bridge_

"How can it be?" bellowed Hengest. "Those fighters were the best in the Empire. And they were shrugged off as easy as Dopterian flies!"

Nobody reacted to the captain's temper tantrum. Not only because they were used to them, but because it was dangerous even to flinch when the captain was in a foul mood.

_USS Constellation. Bridge_

"Sir, we are out of laser range, but in the state that we are now they can outrun us." said Tarasca, while the doctor healed a minor wound in his scalp

"Understood, Mr. Tarasca." said Matt Decker and sighed. "This has been a wonderful command, I'll miss her."

"Matt, are you sure of this?

"Yes, Ana, I'm sure. Tarasca, set a course toward the Imperial ship, full..."

"Sir, two ships are exiting warp! A Constitution-class starship and a Larson class destroyer!" informed Masada from the science console

"Excalibur and Wellington! Tarasca, belay that order!"

"Aye, sir." Said Tarasca, his expression carefully neutral, although he was slightly disappointed, by not having died in a blaze of glory.

The Enigma was soon shaken by a full rain of torpedoes and phaser beams. Soon, many escape pods began to shoot from the Star Destroyer as she began to be engulfed in flames. The escape pods were swiftly swallowed by the vortex, followed by a probe launched from the Excalibur.

**TO BE CONTINUED...**


End file.
